I'm a great talker, and I talk to my wife till she's about dead; then I'm out of it for the rest of the day; I can't speak German." His manner was the free, friendly manner of the West.

He must be that sort of untravelled American whom March had so seldom met, but he was afraid to ask him if this was his first time at Carlsbad, lest it should prove the third or fourth.

"Are you taking the cure ?" he asked instead.
"Oh, no.

My wife is.

She'll be along directly; I come down here and drink the waters to encourage her; doctor said to.